Guest Post: R.R. Brooks

Here’s a Guest Post from R.R. Brooks, announcing his new book Justi The Gifted. check it out.

Justi the Gifted, an epic fantasy tale by R.R. Brooks ( www.appalachianroundtable.com ) will be published momentarily by LeoPublishing L.L.C. (www.leopublishing.net) and can be ordered from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and your local bookstore (they’d love for you to visit).

A gift from a god can be good. But what if it is damaged?

Women’s wear was another terminology problem. No skirts but in one case I put a teenage girl in pants and also called them “breeches.” When the love-struck, teenaged girl Tirea goes after Justi at a picnic and gets bitten by ants, we learn what she wears:

“She jumped up, grabbed her calf, and danced around swatting at her breeches. Apparently whatever was biting was still at it, so she took off the pants and craned her head to check the leg.”

Women generally wind up in a gown and, in some cases, only a “garment.” That worked when Provani, a prostitute wakens with a dream of Justi. (“She dropped her night garment and washed in the bowl of cold water ….”) When a Tantrocan (invading barbarian) lieutenant attacks Justi’s mother Arturi in her shop, she says, “Leave me alone. I am not interested in your foul needs.” And then we learn what she is wearing:

“The resistance seemed to inflame him, and he lifted her onto the table. Arturi screamed and kicked, but the man caught her flailing legs and trapped them between his own, leaving his hand free to push up her garment.”

When Princess Mercerio is displayed on the battlement walls to stop the attack of the good guys, she wears a gown (almost):

“Several Tantrocans in full leathers emerged from the smoke. The largest held a dark-haired girl who Justi knew, as much from his heart as from the tug from his amulet. Mercerio was clad in a ripped gown that left her legs and one shoulder bare.”

This passage also shows the use of “leathers” to describe the battle garments of the barbarians. I doubt whether I ever felt the need to specify what the good Zellish were wearing. And head coverings never came up.

Clothing was not a big issue in writing Justi the Gifted. It did take some thought, nevertheless, to avoid the use of a jarring modernism in this long-ago setting.